An American Witch in London
by LegendLover94
Summary: Moving schools and countries in her in fourth year isn't the only challenge Lovanna is going to face in her next four years at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. She will experience everything from friendship to heartbreak, cruel stereotyping to fighting for her life. However, one thing is for sure in her life, she is a Yankee surrounded by red coats.


I never liked crowds. They're made up of people rushing to get somewhere, people moving so slow they might as well be going backwards, and worst of all, children. Now I'm not anti-child, I was a child well still am technically, I just despise horrible children. The ones that have no manners and bump into you or the ones that scream and cry while the parents do nothing about it. I guess I dislike parenting styles more than the child itself, normally I adore children. The children at King's Cross Station vary from adorable to the devil reincarnated. That combined with my dad grumbling about the squeaky wheel on the trolley he's pushing that holds my two trunks and my mother having a death grip on my elbow thinking I'll somehow get lost or taken from her at the age of fourteen, I'm not in a cheery mood. According to my brother I tend to get, as he puts it, "smartasstic" when in a bad mood. Right now, I've gone past smartasstic to quietly cursing the world so it's safe to say that I am not looking forward to anything happening in the next ten minutes or the next four years of schooling. Being the new kid is terrifying, especially being a new kid in a new_ country_. Talk about culture shock, I'm going from America to Britain in less than a month and then going to a new school after everyone has already established their friend groups, how delightful. I normally don't have a problem making friends, but coming in so late into a school house is going to be awkward for everyone. I'm taken out of my thoughts by my mother shaking my arm.

"Time to go to the platform dear." She says as she readjusts her shoulder bag. I take a deep breath and walk through the wall with her after my father goes through with my trolley. A brightly colored train sits next to the platform, ready to take off. Kids from the ages eleven to seventeen are milling in and out of the train, catching up with friends and saying goodbye to their families. I've never been a homesick kid, I'm as independent as a fourteen-year-old girl could be, but I am dreading saying goodbye to my parents because as sad as it sounds, they're the only people I know here. Maybe I'll get lucky and meet someone on the train, but it's far more logical that I'll have to wait until classes begin to even make an acquaintance. With that thought in mind, I hug my parents a little tighter than necessary and turn back to the train. With a deep breath I step up into the train with my trunk following behind me. The interior of the train is a bit cramped, especially with the amount of kids milling around in the walkway. Compartments line one side of the walkway, each containing soft looking benches on both sides of the compartment and all of which seem to have at least one person in it. I keep walking down the walkway, hoping to find an empty compartment that I can sit and read in. After passing compartments filled with kids and one with three boys who looked to be a little too mischievous to interact with on the first day, I came to the end of the compartments. The last one housed a small girl with blonde hair that looked a few years younger than me, reading a magazine upside down, well someone who does that can't really judge me too much. With that thought I push open the compartment door.

"Excuse me. Do you mind if I sit in here? Everywhere else is full."

"Oh yes, go ahead and join me." She said in a soft voice, that when accompanied with her large eyes gave an unnerving feeling to take root in my stomach.

"I'm Lovanna Vasquez. And you are?" I ask while brushing my hair behind my ear.

"Luna Lovegood. Very nice to meet you. Lovanna, does that have a special meaning? Mine means moon, I often wonder if that is why I sleep walk."

"Oh, maybe that's the reason. I think it means graceful warrior in Latin. What are you reading?" I try to change the subject to keep the conversation going as long as possible. I am surprised that she has yet to say something about my American accent.

"The Quibbler, it's a very interesting read. I have extra copies if you'd like one." She pulls out one of the magazines from her bag and hands it to me.

I take in the whimsical front cover and the articles of creatures I've never heard of, whether they are fake or just rare I do not know, but right now it's best that I don't criticize something that the only person I know on this train is interested in. "We don't have one of these in the U.S., well at least not in California. Does it only print in the U.K.?" I ask while flipping through the pages. It was like those No-Maj magazines that print conspiracy theories.

"Oh, yes. My father is the editor and he has not expanded to the U.S. yet. But maybe one day when-" she was cut off by a loud bang coming from the compartment next to us. We made eye contact and seem to agree on the same thing, we jumped up and peaked out of the compartment door. Some purple smoke was wafting out of the neighboring compartment, I didn't approach it incase it had had any side effects, but my riding companion had no such reservations because the next thing I knew, Luna was walking forward and reaching out to open the door. The smoke that the door managed to keep in now billowed out at Luna and made its way down the walkway.

"Luna!" I walk towards her, but hesitated to grab her arm, whatever that smoke was it's already diffused into the air so touching her won't cause me more harm than the air I've already breathed in, so I touch her elbow to get her attention.

"Are you okay Luna?" She doesn't seem to be affected by the smoke. Leave it to this small girl to walk into an unknown substance for curiosities sake. Hasn't she ever heard the saying "curiosity killed the cat"?

"Why hello loves, come to see where all the fun is coming from?" Said a stocky boy with fire red hair as he leaned against the door frame. A boy with almost the exact same features sat farther down the bench across from a darker skinned boy with longer, darker hair. There was a difference in the similar boys, the one farther down the bench had a slightly more conniving smirk than the boy in front of us. They both however had the same brown eyes that sparkled with something that made you both hesitant and entranced.

I swept my eyes across the room and brought my eyes back to the twin standing in front of us, "Is that all British boys' definition of smoothness? Because if it is then I'm going to dislike this country even more than I originally thought." I say while cocking my head to the side and looking at the other boys for an answer.

The smirks on the boy's face falls as the two boys behind him laugh at his expense.

"I like her. What's your name love?" Asks the darker skinned boy with an adorable smile.

"Lovanna Vasquez." I look to my side and see that Luna is silently watching the scene play out in front of her, "And this is Luna Lovegood, if you don't already know her." Although if they did already know her I'm sure they would have greeted her before I spoke.

"Ah we've got an American in our presence boys. What's a Yankee like you doing here, all the way 'cross the pond?" Asks the other twin with a balanced level of teasing and cruelness in his tone.

"I might have answered that if you had introduced yourselves and actually acknowledged my friend here," I gesture to Luna, "And here I was thinking that British people were supposed to be more well-mannered than us…'Yankees'" and look back at them with a cool expression waiting for their response that with probably include more sass.

"Ignore these blokes love. They're just trying to rile you up. My name's Lee Jordan quidditch announcer extraordinaire at your service." He makes a show of taking my hand in his and kissing it and Luna, who stands next to me observing the interaction, laughs so loud that it makes Lee retreat to the back corner of the room with wide eyes. While she is a bit eccentric, she seems to be a good enough person at her young age. Hopefully she'll learn better social skills in the years to come. What with it probably being her first year here, she'll make friends that will help guide her. A small pinging sound comes from the twin still sitting down on the red bench. He's fiddling with some small metal tools in his hand.

"What'd you got there thing 2?" He didn't look up at first, probably didn't know I was talking to him. No, he didn't look up until I was standing in front of his seated position. "Are you half-blood or No-Maj-born?" I ask while looking at the metal thing I've recognized as a lock picking set he's holding.

"Am I a what? What in the bloody hell is a No-Maj-born?" He asks with a raised eyebrow and a confused look on his face. Well I guess the slang for No-Maj is different here, what did I expect though? They call their fries chips for Christ's sake. A small amount of anxiety is bubbling up in my stomach. I try to keep my blush from showing on my cheeks, which is difficult when you become flustered and are surrounded by three strange, good-looking guys.

"A person born to nonmagical parents. Hence the term 'no-maj'" I replied as I took a seat next to him. He looked at me with raised eyebrows, "No. I'm a pureblood."

"Then I'm even more surprised that you have a lock picking kit" I glance down at the kit in his hands, "I imagined that locks at a wizarding academy would be harder to break into. Unless this is just for shits and giggles."

His face changes from confused to amused slowly, his smile stretching across his face as his eyebrows raise is slight shock. He gives me a once over before settling his eyes to look into my eyes directly. "What did you say your name was? Lovanna?" At my nod his grin raises slightly on the right side of his mouth. "I have a feeling we are going to be great friends Lovanna." He keeps eye contact with me as he takes my hand and raises the back of it to his lips and gives it a feather light kiss. "The name's Fred Weasley" he said as he lowered my hand back its original resting place on my lap.

"I don't know about th-" I was interrupted by another student sticking their head into the compartment.

"What's going on in here?" Asked a tall boy with vivid red hair and glasses, who stood in the spot where Luna previously occupied. She must have went back to the other compartment when I started talking to Fred.

"Must you three always make my job harder?" The red-headed boy said as he looked at Fred, Lee, and who I can assume is Fred's unintroduced twin.

Fred and the unintroduced twin grinned at this statement. "I don't know Percy. We might have made your last year enjoyable-" Fred grinned as he leaned back on the bench.

"If it wasn't for your Humongous Big-head badge." His twin finished for him as he sat forward on the bench with a similar grin to Fred's.

As the three red heads continued to argue I made eye contact with Lee from across Fred's wild hand gestures and motioned for him to come closer to me. Dodging both twins' set of hands, he finally made it to my side and sat down beside me on the bench.

"What is Fred's twin's name and who is that Percy guy?" I leaned close to his ear to ask him, even though it's not like the other three people in this compartment would hear me if I was talking at a normal volume.

"That's George, and Percy is their older brother. You're going to see a lot of red heads here, they have two other siblings that go here." He told me as he gestured to the boys in question.

"That's gonna take some getting used to."

"What is darling? Seeing my handsome face all around the castle?" Fred says in my left ear, as he half listens to Percy and George argue. Lee looks at him and then at me with an amused smile, or what he probably deems as amused smile but what I just deem as annoying.

"I don't know about you, but I prefer Percy's looks over yours." I look at his shocked and slightly disgusted face out of the corner of my eye. "Do you think you could introduce me to him?" I ask with a smile as my eyes sweep from him to Percy. I intentionally give Percy a long look over just to sell the point home.

"Sorry to break your heart love but he's got a girlfriend; how he got her to say yes, only Godric knows." He glances at me. In reaction to the raised eyebrow I'm currently giving him, his expression turns more conniving. "Plus, I don't know if you'd, meet his standards." He said it so nonchalantly as if it was a throw away comment about the weather. Asshole.

After a small pause to collect my thoughts I turn my body to look at him directly with a small, patronizing smile on my face. "Yeah that's a problem, I find that I'm always over qualified. Men," I glance around the room, "or should I say boys just can't handle it."

Before he can respond I stand from the bench and make my way towards the compartment door and indirectly, right in front of Percy. " 'scuse me. Sorry." I try to get past him and back to my original compartment, but his hand reaches out to grab my elbow.

"You're American? Are you the new student?" Percy asks, letting go of my elbow when he realizes I'm no longer walking away.

"Yeah. Lovanna Vasquez." I hold out my hand to introduce myself.

"Percy Weasley, Head boy. I've been looking for you. I'm going to be escorting you to the great hall for your sorting ceremony." It's then that I notice the small badge pinned to the school robes he has on. "We're almost to Hogwarts, so all of you should probably change into your robes." He looks at me, "I'll come back here to get you in about fifteen minutes." With that he turns and walks briskly out of the doorway and down the hall. I have a feeling that these next four years will be interesting to say the least if this is my first day and I haven't even stepped onto the school grounds.


End file.
